Right Bucks: My Perspective Grows

I've moved these comments from another thread because I wanted them housed in a container that reflects back to me my own accomplishment. It don't think it was clear to anyone else just how far I was stretched by reading KW's essay and pushing into my feelings about it. The lack of positive mirroring about that (and other things) inhibits my growth and I really need to grow here.

It took me almost all day to read this because I have such a hard time with reading and also because this topic is so difficult for me to look at. It was a double whammy. But I did it.

It's totally okay if I get no response from others, but I at least need to hold it myself with respect and have the space to feel like I've accomplished something without being an idiot in someone else's blog. But if anyone feels the impulse to dis me for this, please just move on to some other activity. I don't need more negativity about this. I know I'm not developed in this line. It's reallyfreakin'obvious. Don't make it harder for me plz.

So, its my blog and I can be an idiot if I want to.

And now, with no further ado, what I wrote:

Love this:

"...trying to find your front by running away from your back."

KW is usually very helpful for me with little pithy sayings like that. Eventually, I will outgrow it and it will become what I see as "polemic", but for now, I need it to stabilize the vision. Humor serves that purpose.

...back to more reading...

I'll be honest. I skipped all the text that rehashes "The Model". Rehash is beginning to get on my nerves. It happens all too often around these parts. That's one of the reasons I want the Core Integral material. I'm way past ready to cut to it.

---oOo---

At any rate, one of the things that just became clear to me while reading this bit,

"And no longer an anti-food stance, or in general, no longer anti-food as religious crusade: even meat, and alcohol, and other "untouchables" were entirely appropriate if entered with empty awareness (and they were ritually used in just that manner, as an indication that all aspects of samsara were an expression of the Divine and thus not to be despised)."

is that I do believe I have an allergy to intentional Ascending practice. When I adopt a practice that expresses a particular aspect of piety that I value, I IMMEDIATELY feel in my body a resistance. A visceral, "Hey! Don't reject me! I'm not bad! I'm just drawn that way!" kind of thing. It is instantaneous.

However, there are some things I do which I'm not just "religious" about, not merely stuck up about, but feel literally "not okay" if I'm not allowed to do them. I want it to be my God-given human right to recycle and compost and buy organic. I went thru a massive melt-down last year when I was audited by HUD and was afraid they were going to adjust my rent in such a way that I would no longer be able to afford to buy organic food. No. Not just afraid. TERRIFIED!!! wft?

This is not the reaction of someone who wants to be just "intentional". This is the reaction of someone who fears for her life. I remember giving up on the project of buying only non-toxic and sustainable non-food items such as paper products and soaps. It was horrible. Nearly had a panic attack when I had to buy more stuff from Walmart. I had previously been able to reduce my Walmart shopping list down to 2-3 items per month and I was beyond proud of that. Way beyond! Now I have to buy the paper-towels and toilet paper there again and the shampoo and toothpaste. The depth of shame that I try not to feel when I go in there is beyond what I can describe.

I'm tempted to write "LOL" because it's obviously so absurd, but it's actually not funny. The amount of suffering I'm experiencing is no laughing matter. It is tapping into a primal Death Terror.

---oOo---

Yeah. KW nailed me here (sort of):

"(At the same time, we don't want to go to the other extreme; too many women's spirituality movements end up being a merely Descending Path, emphasizing nothing but the body and the biosphere and Agape and compassion—without a clue as to real Eros and transcendence and Emptiness—and thus they end up endlessly emoting and parading a personalistic and egoic series of unending feelings, preferably on a full moon night, as if that were liberation)"

This is helpful to me. This neatly articulates my pathology. In fact, I'm doing it right now. LOL And that is funny! Pulling the Self out and away from the vMeme that "I" had previously been Embedded in and have been trying to get away from for years tickles. WOO-HOO!! I'M NAKED!

Ken names two mistakes:

1. The ascending rejection of all things material
2. The descending indulgence in all things material

It is now much more clear wtf happened to me. I was raised with the opposite mistake:

• The ascending rejection of all things spiritual

And therefore developed the reactionary pathology:

• The descending indulgence in all things spiritual

The confusion for me has been that we all usually ass-u-me that material is a descsending path and spiritual is an ascending path. It literally goes without saying. But my Egg-Donor was a Randian Objectivist who saw the acquisition of material goods and human dominion over matter was the ascending path and anything spiritual was descending and belonged to the Dark Ages. I refuse to call her the "M-word" for - NOW - obvious reasons.

So, my understandable resistance to her path put me in a situation where I literally felt exposed and unprotected by her if I didn't comply and compete against other people for resources and material gain, but neither did I feel safe in complying because that exposed me to the aggression of others. Like a calf born in a migrating herd of wildebeest, if I didn't get up and start running within 20 minutes of birth, I would likely be caught by predators and any maternal attempt to protect me would endanger the entire herd. But like a human infant, if I didn't get a sense that my Mother would do whatever was necessary to protect me while I learned how to live well, the entire material world would be felt, on a visceral level, as a threat to my survival. It was literally the Operating System programmed into my hardware upon booting up for the first time.

The whole world is so confusing for me. I literally do not understand it. I do not know how to navigate in it and I feel terror when I try to learn.

I don't know how much of this is going to be possible for me to overcome. But getting a better view of the problem is helpful - in a way. At least I can experience the tickle sensation when I realize that I am not that. But when I try to embody the solution...   I'm instantly catapulted into Death Terror.

What to do?

...back to more reading...

Okay! I'm getting a better vision of where KW is standing now. This is important:

"...Granted, if some people cannot afford to attend a Dharma class, then we want to make every effort to make provisions for these individuals.  But that is a completely separate issue, and at heart it is not in any way different from any other goods and services: I think most people feel that we ought to make basic medical services available to people regardless of their capacity to pay.  Just so, we should make Dharma available to people regardless of capacity to pay.

But that is not what bothers so many people (and so many teachers of Dharma).  Rather, they tend to feel that even if people can afford to pay, they shouldn't have to.  That Dharma is "above all that," that Dharma shouldn't sully itself with dirty bucks.  In other words, that Dharma ought to present itself as thoroughly disgusted with the gross realm.  So that Dharma's "purity" is beyond all that."

And this:

"This type of sliding scale, of course, is frequently used in law firms, in medical establishments, in psychotherapy, and in social services, and I personally am very fond of it.  Unfortunately it is rather hard to apply to seminars and retreats and similar Dharma events, because the bookworking is so complex, but there may be various areas of Dharma teaching where it might be creatively applied."

I had no idea that sliding scale was possible in my dealings with Integral or any other Spiritual Teachings or Teachers. I've just been going along as if Integral is defending it's right to be a part of the aggressive/hostile and incomprehensible world that surrounds me. I've gotten the impression that Bill Harris' attitude was pretty much universal (I hope I don't need to show you what I'm referring to. He's a notorious extreme). I've also been profoundly confused by this because there is so much ado made about compassion and care.

But I'm seeing now that KW may not be blind to my situation. I truly am disabled. And the irony of it all is that my disability is precisely concerned with what you're bringing up here.

I have long recognized that the ability to carry my own weight and to produce more than I consume is a valuable thing. But that does not make it possible. It doesn't mean that I am now capable of doing so. The Mind is all dressed up and has come to the Party, but the Body is in rags and hiding in a refrigerator box by the tracks.

This explains why I'm gaining so much right now from two teachers who are giving it away. Both are from that old tradition. And as my "signature" at the bottom of all my comments says, I'm only paying $14.95 a month for all the amazing, amazing, AMAZING help I'm receiving here. But make no mistake; $15 a month is a huge budget item for me. And I have to forgo many things in order to pay it.

The end.

---oOo---

Instantly, I feel drowsy again. It's a stress reaction, I know it. This topic just makes me wanna check out.